From the Sea to the City

We ask municipalities to cooperate in the launch of a European-wide alliance aimed at promoting and strengthening joint initiatives and existing and future actions between municipalities/cities, EU representatives, civil society organisations and other international networks to agree on the steps concerning how to collectively pursue a progressive European migration policy from below. The first step of this joint cooperation will be the constitution of a solidarity-based platform among all the above mentioned actors in order to agree on common objectives.

Ensure that during COVID-19 crisis:
a) migrants and refugees trying to reach Europe by crossing the Mediterranean Sea can be rescued without any delay and can disembark in a safe harbour in the EU taking all necessary and urgent actions and positions against the closure of seaports and in favour of sea rescue.
b) migrants and refugees are fully protected by the COVID-19 emergency measures. Specifically, we call for refugees and migrants to have access to information on the pandemic in their own language, access to national, regional and municipal healthcare and services, to be safely housed, and for sufficient resources to be made available for each country.

Demand an active role of cities, municipalities, civil society organisations and the “From the sea to the city” network in directly managing EU-funds concerning migration, more specifically having a voice on how they are distributed and managed at national and regional level.

Create safe, efficient, continuous and legal corridors to Europe (“corridors of solidarity”) towards and across Europe by setting up a long-term comprehensive mechanism for arrival and reception with European municipalities at its center. This includes advocating for the immediate improvement of conditions – on the Greek islands in particular, and monitoring the situation in Turkey, and in Libya where migrants and refugees are illegally turned back.

In many European cities, local administrations and civil society have implemented initiatives and measures to ensure the access to fundamental rights and dignity for migrants and refugees. These initiatives should be taken as a model to develop new coordinated policies at the EU and the regional level in order to implement more humane policies which improve migrant people’s access to fundamental rights.